Picture Review: Zanflare F6

Zanflare F6

Introduction
This is my first ever Zanflare branded light.
Zanflare doesnt have many flashlights in their collection it only consist of 2 Flashlights which is F1 anf F2, these are a bigger AA-battery and a 18650 type flashlight, they also have a charger and some lighting related product like LED strip, cabinet light and solar dusk light so not many flashlight products but that could change in the future.

Link to Zanflare F6 official page.

Pro:
Small
Beautiful, with the provided chain the light looks like a jewelry
Blink blink if you like that gangster look :smiley:
Enough lumens on medium for close range work
Magnetic Tail-cap
Built it Charger.
My wife would think this is beautiful and there that you got one reason and no hiding from her. :smiley:

Cons:
Rather Heavy
Short run-time, not enough time to do some real work.
Twisty operation is not practical with one hand especially with sweaty palm.
Whistle is useless, you’ll end up annoying yourself.

Data from Zanflare:
Max Output: 200 lumens
Max Beam Distance: 59 m
Max Beam Intensity: 1200 cd
Max Run time: 288 minutes

LED: Cree XP-G2
Length: 54 mm / 2.13 inch
Weight: 31 g / 1.09 oz

Battery: 10180 x 1
Features: Magnetic End, Whistle, IPX8 Waterproof
Activity: Gear, Hiking, Camping

The website doesnt mention runtime for each mode so here it is i copied it from the manual
Low: 1.5lm (4.8h)
Medium: 15lm (2.5h)
High: 200lm (18min)

As you can see the runtime is rather short which is not surprising from a tiny 70mah battery. For a comparison A nitecore Tip has 500mah with higher lumens and longer runtime not to mention easier to operate one handed.

Zanflare retail box

Instruction manual or rather a nice booklet detailing how to operate, disassembled the light and charge the unit.

No specification on the outside

This is how the light is package inside, the chain and the flashlight was packed in vacuum sealed plastic.
1x Micro Usb charging cable, 1x Zanflare F6, 1x 10810 battery includec, 60cm Chain and 2 spare o-rings

The spare o-rings

The light in you hand, what a tiny flashlight with a whistle at the back.

A twisty light, this how the light is intended to be operated. Notice the pattern at the front of the light? it is there to increase grip but i think they place it on the wrong side I wish the whole head has knurling so it isn’t so slippery. Well i wished the whole flashlight isn’t so slippery. For my sweaty hand and hot climate operating one handed is nearly impossible. I might have to remove one of the two rubber o-rings since the first o-rings doesn’t feel that heavy when it engages the second o-rings then it started to become harder to twist.

The light seperated into 3 parts, battery is included. Noticed the DQG branded battery.

The head, the driver and a spring.

Open the head and you will find the micro usb charging port, the manual say 1 hour to fully charge the tiny battery.
Red is charging while blue indicate full.

Zanflare is etched on the flashlight head.

Emitter side, Both Nitecore and Zanflare uses OP reflector.

Comparison to my other key-chain, Nitecore Tube, Zanflare F6 and Nitecore Tip 2017
The Nitecore tip is still may favorite key-chain light.

a closer look.

Summary
Xanflare F6 is a nice looking keychain flashlight it is beautiful but its small size is also one of its drawback, for similar money i prefer Nitecore Tip for its higher lumens and longer run-time and while the size is bigger it still small enough to be not noticeable. Nitecore Tip is also more friendly to one handed operation no problem with slippery hand.

For similarly priced light i would have gone with Nitecore tip instead, this is a good light but only at discounted price.
A niche light for sure, so buy this because you like it dont because you need it or depend on it.

Beamshots video:

Video Review: Uploading.

I would give Zanflare F6 a 7/10

Thanks for the kind words. :smiley:

Hey Rizky_p,

Would you happen to know the charge rate? 50mA?

Maybe a USB tester would show how much power was being drawn.

I’m not him, but yes, I’m guessing 50 mA, which is ideal AFAIK.

My F6 with original battery charges at 0.05 A and fluctuates a bit(most of the time .05, momentarily between .06 and .03). Just tested with two different Keweisi USB meters, starting with an open circuit voltage of 3.91 volts. These meters, meant for testing charge for cell phone and such, don’t really have a proper scale for measuring charge for tiny devices like 10180 chargers or BT headsets.

I have had this light since spring 2017 when there was an excellent deal, about €10 I guess. So far happy with it. The untreated brass will not stay shiny more than a week, but that’s fine.

Edit: Just ~20 minutes later my USB analyzer shows .01 and 0 amperes and the F6 still has the red “charging” light on. Disconnected and battery open circuit voltage shows 4.11 volts. Seems ok, not indicative of overcharging. Resuming charge now.

Edit: ~10 minutes later still charging and test shows 4.199 volts.

Edit: ~5 minutes later the F6 shows blue light. After 1 minute of rest, OC voltage of battery at 4.202 volts. Perfect this far and for now I’m not going to test if there is overcharge or discharge after leaving it plugged in.

I’m using a regular Huawei 5V/2A cell phone mains(230V flat euro plug) to USB adapter and a Huawei cable. Analyzers show around 5.25 volts input. I know none of this will matter when powering a very low demand charging unit if everything is in order, but I am just making sure this is the case.

Thanks for the update. It looks like it has a very nice charging circuit built in.

I ordered my light on 11/11 and it’s still not here. :weary:

BTW, it seems I was wrong about "spring" 2017. It was in early June when I bought the original F6 for $9.99.

It's discontinued now and the new model F6s is currently on flash sale for a similar price on GB. The product specs don't show a difference between those, not one that I could spot. Except the original was offered with or without battery and the new one just says "battery included". The specs are also a bit confusing on the color temperature, but I never saw other than cool white available. I prefer cool white as in a light like this. It's not meant to give a nice natural sunlight view. A miniature like this is either for backup or emergency use at close range or for wow factor. Maximum lumens are more important than a nice temp and tint.

This was quite expensive at $ 20 - 30 for what it is and I would not buy it. For $10, definitely. I have come to prefer this style over the flat box keychain lights, and have had the F6 as a backup EDC necklace light ever since I got it. I may have less capacity per weight or volume than the tube or tip , but I do not need any more and it's a nice flashlight. It's a backup and the modes are almost ideal for that use. I do have a proper flashlight with better features on me anyway when I might need one. In case I preferred a tiny light on a keychain I might choose differently, but I hang this on my neck. I ordered the newer F6s very recently and won't be able to compare them until late January, I guess.

The whistle is useless and just makes for added length and weight. I wish it was not there. This will be easily eliminated if I can be bothered to do some basic metal work.

My F6s has arrived. The differences to old version?

  1. F6s is longer than the original F6. It’s just the whistle part of the battery holder, and this has no effect on function. They enlarged the outside dimensions or the rear piece with no practical benefit.
  2. Included battery is not the previous DQG branded white one, but a green non-branded one.
  3. Overall quality of assembly seems worse on the F6s. PCBs are not properly centered and aligned. Twisting to activate is no longer smooth and the light sometimes flashes on activation because the PCBs are tilted. I don’t know yet if there is an issue with the threads., but guess not.

The whistle does not really work on either type.

New and old parts seem to lego. My assumption is the circuit and emitter are identical, but can’t prove that.

The magnet within the whistle cavity on my old F6 has become loose. No other issues with the F6 so far, and this one will be easily fixed. The F6s needs a disassembly and reassembly or at least some violent bending before it’s very usable. It technically works, but is not up to my standards.

Comparison photos to follow when I have both lights on the same table.

I ordered mine 9 weeks ago and I guess it got lost. Gearbest wanted to refund my money, but I said “no thanks, just send me another when it is back in stock”.

Can anyone tell me how they install the magnet? Does it press into place behind the battery?

My light finally arrived after 3 months in shipping. :person_facepalming:

Anyway, at the shipped voltage of about 3.65v I plugged it into my usb meter to charge it. It looks like the charge rate is about 110 milliamps/0.11A

It looks like the charge rate starts to decrease as the battery gets closer to full. After 7 minutes I can see the rate is now 90 milliamps/0.09A.

At 10 minutes it’s 80 milliamps/0.08A.

Right as it hit 70 milliamps I checked the voltage and its 4.05v.

So it starts at a high rate and gradually tapers off. Whereas most bigger chargers will do a steady high amp charge rate until about 4v then start to taper it off.

I need to check it again, but maybe this charger holds a steady 110 mA from the lowest up to around 3.8v then starts tapering off.

Overall, the charger function seems to be working real nice.